Speaker 1: Welcome to Before Breakfast, a production of iHeartRadio. Good Morning,
Speaker 1: This is Laura. Welcome to the Before Breakfast podcast. Today's
Speaker 1: tip is to figure out ways to shop more mindfully.
Speaker 1: A sale doesn't save you money if you buy more
Speaker 1: than you intend. Fortunately, there are ways to keep calm
Speaker 1: and figure out what will bring the most joy to
Speaker 1: you and everyone else. This episode is first airing right
Speaker 1: around what we often call Black Friday, the start of
Speaker 1: the holiday shopping season. While there are fewer in person
Speaker 1: doorbuster sales these days than in the past, many retailers
Speaker 1: still offer deep discounts around Thanksgiving. Often these discounts are
Speaker 1: pitched as being for a limited time only. The idea
Speaker 1: is to nudge people to buy and buy a lot
Speaker 1: because they fear the sale will disappear. And maybe it will,
Speaker 1: But so what If you are buying something you didn't
Speaker 1: truly want or need, then a sale isn't saving anyone money.
Speaker 1: It is still just extra money out the door. But
Speaker 1: I do think there are a few ways to turn
Speaker 1: down the temperature. One is to construct a gift list
Speaker 1: before you start looking at the sales. What do you
Speaker 1: want for the holidays? What do you want to give
Speaker 1: to other people ask them what they want. I am
Speaker 1: guessing that with a little detective work, most of us
Speaker 1: could figure out at least seventy five percent of our
Speaker 1: holiday gift list before Thanksgiving if we wanted. This leaves
Speaker 1: space for extra stuff or last minute requests, but means
Speaker 1: most things are thought of. Then you can go into
Speaker 1: the holiday sales armed with this list. If someone asks
Speaker 1: for a fancy pair of headphones and you see a
Speaker 1: forty percent off sale on those headphones, then you know
Speaker 1: that this is a money saving sale for you. There's
Speaker 1: a chance you would have bought the headphones at full price,
Speaker 1: and now you are getting them for forty percent less
Speaker 1: than you would have had to pay. Excellent, but you
Speaker 1: will be less tempted by a fifty percent off sale
Speaker 1: on something the person did not ask for. You know
Speaker 1: what they want, and so you can do your shopping
Speaker 1: more calmly now. Obviously, sometimes we discover or what we
Speaker 1: want or what we want to get people while we
Speaker 1: are shopping. You come across something exciting and you want
Speaker 1: to get it for someone, or let's be honest, you
Speaker 1: want to get it for yourself. It turns out that
Speaker 1: a lot of Black Friday's shopping is actually people shopping
Speaker 1: for themselves. But if that is the case, then you
Speaker 1: might try giving yourself a short waiting period. It doesn't
Speaker 1: have to be seventy two hours. I do understand that
Speaker 1: these sales are limited, but even a twelve hour waiting
Speaker 1: period could be helpful. In a lot of cases. The
Speaker 1: online sale will not disappear in twelve hours. If you
Speaker 1: are shopping at five pm, maybe decide that you will
Speaker 1: purchase something when you wake up the next morning. If
Speaker 1: you still want it, then so it goes. If you don't,
Speaker 1: or maybe something new has come up, then fine. Now
Speaker 1: you know, sometimes if you think ahead, you can put
Speaker 1: an even big your distance between yourself and something. I
Speaker 1: had my eye on a pair of boots last fall
Speaker 1: that were kind of pricey. It was challenging to find
Speaker 1: my size, so I was having to look at secondary sellers,
Speaker 1: so I just put on my calendar for this year
Speaker 1: to look for those boots back when boots season started.
Speaker 1: I saw the entry on my calendar this fall and
Speaker 1: look them up from that particular retailer, and guess what,
Speaker 1: I no longer had any desire for the boots, So
Speaker 1: there we go. It is fun to buy things, but
Speaker 1: it is less fun to feel like we bought more
Speaker 1: than we wanted. Making a list beforehand and then shopping
Speaker 1: sales can make those sales actually feel like sales, and
Speaker 1: waiting a little bit for everything else can make those
Speaker 1: purchases more mindful too. When we spend wisely, there is
Speaker 1: more money to spend on things that will bring up
Speaker 1: us joy, and I want that for everyone this holiday season.
Speaker 1: In the meantime, this is Laura. Thanks for listening, and
Speaker 1: here's to making the most of our time. Thanks for
Speaker 1: listening to Before Breakfast. If you've got questions, ideas, or feedback,
Speaker 1: you can reach me at Laura at Laura vandercam dot com.
Speaker 1: Before Breakfast is a production of iHeartMedia. For more podcasts
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Speaker 1: wherever you listen to your favorite shows.